Christmas Magic?

I cannot believe that Christmas is only five days away.....It always sneaks up on me now. It didn't use to when I was little. Back then, the days would drag on agonizingly slow and it seemed Christmas morning would never come. And then came the excitement and screams of delight as I furiously tore into my presents. Now Christmas is rather silent and there's nothing I really really want anymore. (except maybe a smartphone. hint hint.) All the magic has been lost, and that makes me sad. But has it really been lost?

This year, the thing that has me the most excited is that my aunt is arriving on Thursday. I am so happy that she's coming a day earlier than we thought she was. Right now, I am eagerly watching for my best friend's Christmas package to be delivered. Later on in the break, I'll go with a group of friends to see the new Star Wars movie. It was when I thought about all those things that I realized that the magic has not been lost. It has simply changed.

Christmas when I was little was simply about getting all the toys I wanted. It was all about me. I may be sad that I no longer care about decorating the tree, but I think I've traded that for something better.

Christmas for me is now more about the time that I get to spend with my family and friends. I love having the break from school to be able to do stuff with my friends and watch movies with my family and have Christmas dinner and listen to amazing Christmas music that reminds me of the real reason that we celebrate Christmas.

Christmas is truly about reading the Christmas story and knowing that the little tiny baby in a manger would grow up to save the world. It's about the light of the star that was just a taste of the light of the world that we would soon come to know. It's about the wise men's gifts that started the tradition of giving gifts to those we love. It's all about the greatest gift of all: Jesus.

Merry Christmas!
~Clarissa

Writing Ugliness

Inspiration can come from anywhere. I mean, literally anywhere. I've got a new project going that arose out of a conversation I had with my friend Kelton. He joked that he was killing me, we had this super weird conversation about torture, and thus The Blood Oath was born.

I've never written a fantasy piece before. I've recently gotten into Brandon Sanderson, who writes epic fantasy but yet fantasy hasn't really pulled at me as a genre that I would write. But, Kelton writes quite a bit of fantasy and the premise of The Blood Oath really wouldn't fit into any other genre. This piece has some firsts for me and writing fantasy is one. The other is writing in omniscient POV. It's also a bit different because we're writing this together and while I've written pieces with other people before it's always gone like this: I write a chunk, and then they write a chunk. With this piece and its POV, Kelton and I sometimes are writing every other sentence but it provides a lot better cohesion of characters and events. But I would say the biggest first for this project is the ugliness that it contains.

I've always been a bit torn about how much ugliness to include in my stories and I've never really written a story about characters who are truly jaded and involved in deeds that aren't right and good. One of the two protagonists, Hanilov, is a street gang member who aspires to become an assassin. He doesn't care much for anyone, he enjoys inflicting pain, and he's an overall jerk. The other protagonist, Esterlyn, comes from a race that is very violent and barbaric and yet she determines to be different.

Without giving spoilers to the story, there is a lot of bloodiness in the way Hanilov treats Esterlyn. He attacks her, tortures her, and almost kills her quite regularly. There are also several instances of his forcing himself on her. Kelton wrote the first bit of it and I was surprised by its intensity and gore. My initial reaction was, this is disturbing and we shouldn't be writing this.

How far should you go when writing ugliness? There's no need to be over-the-top, but you shouldn't sugarcoat either. The reality is there are people out there who do what Hanilov does every day. It's ugly and yes frankly, it's disturbing. But it should be disturbing. When something disturbs us it is able to move us to action. The second part to it is that without ugliness, there can be no beauty. The ending of this story (which I am not going to spoil, sorry) would not be the amazing and beautiful ending that it will be without all the ugliness that precedes it. The depravity from the fall that is showcased in characters like Hanilov is in all of us. It's only a matter of whether we let it take over or not. It's important to know, though, that it is there. Otherwise, we cannot guard against it. And the knowledge of it allows our ugliness to be redeemed into beauty by God.

Don't be afraid of the ugliness!
~Clarissa

When the Lord Hath Taken Away

"The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord." (Job 1:21)

In October, the mom of one of my fellow drama students died from cancer, leaving behind five children all under the age of fourteen. I was not able to attend her memorial service, but it was hard seeing my classmate and knowing what he must be going through.

Mid-November, I went through something that broke my heart and left me wondering how close God really is to me.

Later in November, a father of two boys that we knew died from colon cancer.

Again in November, I found out that one of my close friend's family is going through a tough time.

In December, I heard about a father of ten children who died in an accident.

Last Sunday, we learned that a couple in our church lost their baby granddaughter.

And just today, I learned that a girl in my drama class lost her baby sibling to a miscarriage.

WHY? Why in the world has so much happened in the last two months? There is so much pain for all these people and every single thing has made my heart break and my soul heavy. There is all this awful, saddening stuff happening and so close together. I want to cry just thinking about it now. I'm not going to lie. Pain hurts. Pain sucks. Pain overwhelms. Pain can just grab your heart and break it into a billion pieces until you don't know how it is possible that you are still breathing.

But you know what? I respect pain. I respect tragedy. I could almost say that I welcome it (sometimes). Why? Because pain has the power to transform us in ways that joy never can. I've gone through rough times, and depression, and suicidal thoughts, and apathy, and just hating life in general. All of that is pain. And yet every time, I come out on the other side stronger and better than before. God uses tragedy to change us, to purify us, and to teach us. Sometimes God closes doors and we don't understand why. We scream at Him and demand to know why it hurts so much (been there, done that). However, I choose to believe that there is a reason for every single thing that happens to me whether it's pain or joy. 

I can't pretend to understand what all those families are going through, or even why I went through what I did. But I do choose to believe that God gives, and He takes away. I am grateful for what He gives, and I must choose to be grateful for what He takes away. I must choose to believe that His plan may not make sense to me now, but it is still perfect. I must choose to praise His name in the midst of my pain. It is not an easy road to get there. There will be moments of weakness and doubt. Trusting God will not always take the pain away. In the end, though, God will still be God, and His love and peace and joy will never go away.